Who was Edward Deming? Probably the single msot influential thinker on management in the latter half of the 20th century and the person who birthed TQM, Total Quality Management. Boil down Deming's message and he says: Hunt for continuous improvement in your product or service, and strive to keep your workers highly motivated-a simplification, buit if you want to know more, stop here for a short but intelligible account of Deming's main ideas.